


Darker

by JodiMarie2910



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Dark-ish Belle, F/M, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Homicide, Hurt/Comfort, Two Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-21 07:14:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30018072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JodiMarie2910/pseuds/JodiMarie2910
Summary: Belle, not Rumple, kills Zelena with the dagger. 3x20 with a twist. Dark(ish)!Belle. Two-shot.
Relationships: Belle & Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold, Belle/Rumplestiltskin | Mr. Gold
Comments: 26
Kudos: 27





	1. Chapter 1

" _We grow accustomed to the Dark – / When light is put away – /_

_As when the Neighbor holds the Lamp / To witness her Goodbye – /_

_A moment – We uncertain step / For newness of the night – /_

_Then – fit our Vision to the Dark – / And meet the Road – erect –"_

— _Emily Dickinson, "We grow accustomed to the Dark –" (excerpt)_

"Regina...I didn't expect you back so soon," Zelena, the wicked green witch—who now was not so green—greeted Belle when she entered the sheriff's office. She sat on the small bed by the wall and didn't turn her head until Belle spoke.

"I don't imagine you expected me at all," Belle replied, coming to a halt a few feet from the bars.

Zelena twisted around to face her and scoffed disdainfully.

"What are you doing here?"

"What do you think?" Belle snapped. "You put my Rumple in a cage. I just wanted to see you in one."

Zelena laughed.

"The Dark One has such a soft spot for you. Now I see why. Well, enjoy the show. I won't be in here for long." She gave Belle a sly smile. " _Light_ magic doesn't exact vengeance."

Belle didn't answer.

"Regina has the dagger," Zelena continued. "I know she claims to be forging her new destiny, but I wonder...what sort of plans she might have with it. You know, for your _dear_ Rumplestiltskin. He'll have to do what she wishes. If she has the dagger, he'll have no choice." Her eyes lit up at the awful prospect. "Again."

"Regina's changed. She wouldn't do such a thing," Belle answered stiffly.

Zelena gave her a pitying look.

"You really think that will last?...Oh, didn't she lock you up once for, what, nearly thirty years? You _poor_ girl."

Belle drew herself up.

"Like I said, people can change. Surely even you had some goodness in you once."

Zelena raised an eyebrow.

"And what about you?"

"What about me?"

Zelena smiled—another eerie, wicked smile.

"You may be on the side of the so-called heroes, but you're the Dark One's True Love." The words came out in a near-whisper, like a threat. "Surely you must have some darkness in you."

* * *

_One Year Ago…_

The effects of Regina's fake memory spell hadn't completely worn off.

Belle still had Lacey in her head, still had Lacey's thoughts and inclinations cropping up at random intervals, catching her off guard.

Snow and Henry both suffered nightmares as a lingering side effect of being under sleeping curses. All magic came at a price. Was this Belle's price for waking up?

It had been only three days since she'd regained her memories. Since her dear Rumple had sailed off with the others to rescue Henry.

And while she missed Rumple terribly—and despite her assurances at the dock was not so certain she would ever see him again—a part of her was glad to be able to sort herself out without him around. Without him needing her to be her usual ray-of-sunshine self—the glue holding the shattered pieces of his lonely heart together.

Today, there were cloudy skies on her horizon, and she didn't know how to clear them or if they would ever disappear completely.

She couldn't patch him up the way he'd patched up her chipped cup until she fixed herself.

Until she'd dealt with her conflicting feelings about the memories Lacey had left behind.

Unfortunately, there were traces of Lacey everywhere Belle looked.

Even as Lacey, Belle had lived in the apartment above the library. Lacey, like Belle, had enjoyed reading. Well, 'reading' was a loose term. Lacey liked reading extremely trashy romance novels. Erotica, actually, with a thin semblance of plot.

Not that Belle had skimmed any of the dog-eared pages as she'd re-shelved the books in the library below.

She would never.

She'd bagged up all of Lacey's clothes to give away; they weren't her style; she didn't need them. But she'd let the black trash bag sit in the corner of her bedroom for two days, half-curious to try on some of the tight dresses Lacey wore that drove Rumple to distraction.

Yes, she remembered shamelessly seducing him in the backroom of his pawn shop and plenty of times in public. Just the thought of some of the things Lacey had done in _her_ body made Belle blush with abandon.

Lacey had no shame. Unlike Belle, who underneath her modern clothes was still the proper princess she'd been raised to be. In manners if not in opinions.

Belle knew she had Rumple's heart, but Lacey had _owned_ it. Like _she_ was the powerful one and Rumple was at _her_ mercy. It was heartbreaking but a tiny bit adorable the way Rumple had fallen over himself trying to win Lacey's affections. He'd been a far cry from the man Belle had known in the Dark Castle, who only knew how to deflect and disguise his regard for her.

Yes, those were memories of Lacey's that Belle was actually quite fond of.

It was what came after that shook Belle to her core.

* * *

Power.

Power had ultimately drawn Lacey to Rumple, not the fragile spark of goodness tucked away beneath several centuries worth of dark deeds and schemes. She'd been attracted to his possessiveness, his ruthlessness, his dark magic and everything it could do for her.

And, true, Lacey didn't love Rumple like Belle did, but she _was_ attracted to him.

A snippet of conversation kept replaying in Belle's head.

_You really are as dark as people say._

_Darker, dearie. Much darker._

Lacey's stomach had coiled with desire while she watched Rumple wallop the Sheriff of Nottingham with his cane. Knowing that she had laughed at the man's pain made Belle sick to her stomach, but, unfortunately, Belle couldn't separate the horror of seeing Rumple revert to his old ways from the heated exchange of pleasure that had followed.

And she could no longer separate desiring Rumple—desiring him in every way possible—from the power that made him who he was. Even though he'd once told her he loved power more than her. Even though he'd confessed it was his crutch.

Perhaps Belle would have been able to rid herself of the feeling if she hadn't experienced it before, but she had.

Once. Twice.

_Of course I'll protect you._

His words from the evening she'd found him in the pawn shop.

He had protected her, hadn't he?

Maybe not from himself. Not from the fears and misgivings that led him to drive her away.

But he'd rescued her from three evil witches before, and he hadn't let the Sheriff of Nottingham take her virtue. And he'd saved her kingdom, her family. He couldn't have done that without his power. Of that Belle was certain.

She'd once wanted to turn him into an ordinary man, but it wasn't an ordinary man that she'd fallen in love with, was it?

It was a powerful man, a man who took no prisoners. Who confided in no one save his one-time housekeeper named Belle.

She'd loved him before. But she hadn't understood him. She couldn't comprehend why he'd clung on to his power so fiercely, why darkness had so easily seduced him.

Now she knew how intoxicating power could be, possibly because Lacey had been literally intoxicated most of the time she and Rumple had been cavorting about the town.

Intoxicating, nonetheless.

And terrifying.

* * *

Power.

As much as Belle disavowed power, she held a certain kind of power over Rumplestiltskin. The Dark One.

And if she were honest with herself, Belle liked that.

Not in some twisted way meant to hurt him.

Just in that she knew he would listen to her, even if he didn't listen to anyone else.

There was something wholly seductive about being cared for by a man who cared for no one.

Rumple had once accused her of trying to discover his weaknesses; the Queen had kidnapped Belle because she knew what Belle had not—she _was_ his weakness.

At no time had that been clearer than when her body had been usurped; she wasn't anything like herself, and still he'd stayed by her side. She refused to believe it was merely because Lacey allowed him to give in to his darker impulses without repercussions or rebuke. He'd looked genuinely heartbroken when Lacey hadn't remembered him and genuinely relieved when Belle came back.

He'd told her that she found goodness in others, and if she couldn't find goodness in them, she created it. That she had the power to help him change for the better. That she made him want to be the best version of himself.

Once, she would have rejoiced at that.

Now, she realized that having such power over him came at a cost. The cost being that she could just as easily influence him to do evil as she could influence him to do good.

And now she had inadvertently done both.

How could she move past that?

How could she trust herself to be the force of goodness he needed in his life when the very fiber of her own morality was shredding apart?

She'd always said that Rumple was not the man she'd thought he would be.

But what if she wasn't the person she'd thought she would be?

What if there was darkness in her heart in the same way that there was light in his?

And what if his darkness had called to her, when all along she'd thought it was his light?

Rumple had magically crafted Lacey a necklace, but Belle had wanted one, if only in her dreams.

* * *

Power.

To make her own destiny. To control her fate. To do something of worth in the world.

Belle had wanted nothing less than that, ever since she was a child.

 _Her Handsome Hero_ had taught Belle forgiveness and compassion; it had also taught her that being a hero was a powerful thing.

* * *

Rumple was gone.

He had died a hero, but for all that she was proud of him, Belle felt wretched inside. All the power in the world couldn't save him from the task of killing his father and, by so doing, himself.

It wasn't fair. This wasn't how their story was supposed to end. They were supposed to get their happily ever after together. She'd been so sure of it. So stupidly naive and underestimating of how much darkness there was in the world and how much of it had always been directed at Rumple.

Perhaps she'd saved him from the darkness in the end, but who would save her from the gaping hole in her heart where he had been? From the bitterness slowly wrapping its tendrils around the fresh wounds of her grief. Cast out of Storybrooke, she couldn't even mourn his absence properly, in all the places they'd loved each other.

The pawnshop where they'd found each other again.

The pink Victorian house with the bedroom they'd made love in.

The library he'd bought for her, filled with the books she'd so carefully arranged as she'd done in the Dark Castle library.

The diner where they'd had their first proper date.

Every shred of their brief existence together had vanished, as surely as if it had never happened at all.

That was why she so readily accompanied Neal back to the Dark Castle. It wasn't an altruistic endeavor to reunite Neal with Henry. Some part of her would give _anything_ to bring Rumple back. Even if it involved dark magic, which would surely come at a price.

She understood now the ache Rumple must have felt in losing his son and why he done everything in his power to get back to him.

Would there ever be an end to the cycle of loss?

* * *

Power.

The power of dark magic had brought about Rumple's return, but Neil had been lost and Rumple taken captive by a wicked witch.

Both Rumple's dagger and his mind were lost to him, and Belle had to watch as her newly resurrected love was brought to his knees before he even had a fighting chance.

The next time she saw him, he was in a cage, delirious and spinning, spinning, always spinning.

She took his hand; the simple contact seemed to calm his mind for a moment.

Then he ripped his hand away from her, and the moment was gone.

He didn't look at her when she backed out of the room with tears in her eyes.

* * *

The next time she saw him, she'd lost her memories of whatever had happened during the year in the Enchanted Forest. But Rumple was alive, and that was all that mattered. She thought she could break him free from Zelena, take him by the hand and pull him from under her influence by the strength of her belief in them. Her belief in him. Just as she'd started to break his curse with True Love's Kiss.

When would she learn that life was rarely that simple?

That the darkness toyed with its prey before devouring them.

She brought him close enough to her that she could feel his breath on her face when he told her to _run_.

* * *

_Present Day_

After Regina gave her the dagger, Belle had planned to immediately go to Rumple and give it back to him. She wanted him to be a free man and to know that she still trusted him, regardless of what Zelena had made him do. But instead of arriving at his shop, she found herself at the sheriff's office where she'd heard Zelena was being kept, her powers stripped from her.

She'd only wanted to see the woman behind bars for herself. She wanted to see with her own two eyes that she couldn't cause Rumple or anyone else in the town more harm.

But now, as she stood so close to Zelena, the darkness she'd been keeping at bay all those days and weeks and months seeped into her veins—thick, gluttonous, and full of rage.

Rumple had well and truly lost his son now, and it was all this woman's fault.

He'd been kept in a cage for over a year, defenceless and going madder by the day, and it was all this woman's fault.

Belle had been powerless to stop her when she'd found him in Zelena's storm cellar, but today Zelena was in a cage, and despite the scornful way she gazed upon Belle, _she_ was the powerless one.

For the first time, there was a real war in Belle's head between what she knew in her head to be right and honorable and what she truly desired in her heart.

She wanted Rumple to be a free man, and as long as Zelena was alive, she threatened that.

"You haven't answered me... _dearie_ ," the woman taunted through the bars. She rose to her feet, and Belle automatically edged closer to her cell.

What had she said?

Oh, yes.

_Surely, you must have some darkness in you._

"I don't use dark magic," Belle evaded, keeping her tone light and flat. "I'm not his pupil. I'm not like you."

 _Or Cora or Regina_ , she mentally added. _Well, she wasn't, was she?_

Zelena studied her. She snaked her delicate fingers around the bars and pressed her body against them.

Her gaze pierced Belle's, but Belle didn't look away.

"Well, of course I know that. But then, you're also not how I thought you would be. Shouldn't you be off celebrating with your friends?" She curled her lip. "Or is there something you'd like to say to me?"

Belle took another step forward.

She wasn't the person she'd believed herself to be, either.

"Yes. Yes, there is," she answered.

She was darker.

Much darker.

And maybe she couldn't use magic, but she could use that darkness as a weapon.

"Then go on, dearie. Before they release me to be on my merry way."

Without another thought, Belle pulled the dagger from where she'd concealed it under the breast of her coat, and before Zelena had time to pull back, she plunged it into her heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I recently watched Once Upon a Time for the first time. I loved Rumbelle, but I really hated the path their relationship took after Season 3, and that's...all I'm going to say about that.
> 
> This is very Belle-centric because I wish she had been more fleshed out as a character than her scenes in the show allowed her to be. I also wish she had outgrown her persistent naivety concerning Rumple. He is certainly very flawed, but I think it was pretty unrealistic of her to expect him to change so rapidly and completely considering who he's been for so long and all that he's been through.
> 
> Thus, this is my feeble attempt to get her to understand how consuming darkness can be.
> 
> A very small part of the dialogue with Zelena was taken directly from 3x20 and altered from Zelena's conversation with Rumplestiltskin.
> 
> Second part will be the aftermath of Belle's decision.


	2. Chapter 2

Oh god, what had she done?

Belle crumpled to the ground in front of the heap of shattered porcelain that had been Zelena.

Before she could think any further, the porcelain dissolved into a mist that swirled up with a life of its own and then disappeared. Belle shuffled back across the floor, unsure if she should expect a grainy apparition to materialize. The dagger lay several feet from her where she had tossed it away; she snatched it up and scrambled to her feet.

Heart pounding, she whirled around the room but saw nothing. No one.

Once it appeared that she would not be attacked by a disembodied spirit, she lowered the dagger and stared at the empty cell where Zelena had been.

Gone. The witch was totally gone.

But what did that mean?

Oh god, what had she _done_?

The tightness in Belle's chest made it hard to breathe.

No body. No...evidence. That was good, right?

No one would see...

Oh, what was she even thinking about—evidence?! She had _killed_ a person! And she couldn't even be sure that they were dead.

No, no, this wouldn't do. She couldn't think about this now. Regina could come back at any moment, and if she found Belle here, well…

She tucked the now-defiled dagger back into her coat and left the office, quickly.

Cursing her decision to wear heels, Belle ran the short and yet too long distance to Rumple's pawnshop. When she stumbled in the door, delirious with panic, Rumple was behind the counter, inspecting a lamp. He immediately left off when he saw her, and his brow creased with concern at her distraught appearance.

"Belle! Is everything all right?" He stepped out from behind the counter and caught her as she collapsed into his arms.

"Rumple...something...s-something t-terrible has h-happened."

"What is it, sweetheart? You're shaking. What's wrong?"

"I..." Belle took a deep breath. She couldn't get the words out. "I...I..."

She didn't want to say it. She couldn't say it. Saying it would make it real.

Rumple pushed her away to arm's length so that she had no choice but to look at him. His grip on her trembling shoulders was gentle but firm.

"Belle. Look at me. You must calm down and tell me what happened." He tilted her chin up with his fingers so that she looked in his eyes. "Look at me."

She supposed he meant that to be comforting, but she didn't want to look at him, didn't want to see his expression when he heard what she'd done.

In the end, she had no choice. He wouldn't let her pull away.

"I killed her," she confessed weakly.

Rumple dropped the hand that had been touching her face.

"What? Killed who?"

"Zelena." She squeezed her eyes shut and took a deep, steadying breath. "Regina gave me your dagger, and I...I didn't mean to, but I went to visit her at the sheriff's office, and I...I killed her." She opened her eyes with that last statement but looked down at their shoes, which were nearly touching from how close they stood.

"Zelena." Rumple's tone made her look back up at his face. Part confusion, part...anger? "What did she do to you?" he demanded. "What did she say—"

"She didn't do anything to me." Belle shook her head adamantly. "I just..." She'd just lost every shred of self-control she had left. "I killed her," she repeated softly, as though she were realizing it for the first time.

His hands on her shoulders, his voice—they were the only things pulling her back from the abyss in her mind, grounding her to herself.

Rumple studied her for a long moment; she wasn't sure if he was re-evaluating her as a person or trying to figure out how to respond.

Maybe a bit of both.

"If you killed her," he finally said, in a tone that left no room for argument, "it's because you knew what a threat she would be if she ever got her powers back. To this town. To everyone."

Oh, if only that were true.

Belle stepped forward and wrapped her arms around his back. She hugged him like she might never let him go.

"No. No, I didn't do it for them. I did it for you. She hurt the man I love. She brought you back just to torture you. She took your son from you. Your _son_. That's why I...I..." She trailed off and buried her face in his shoulder. "I'm so sorry I couldn't help you before. I'm so sorry."

"Sorry?" Rumple threaded his fingers into her hair, cradling her head. "Oh, sweetheart, it's not your fault. None of this is your fault. No one has ever cared for me as you have." She tried to focus on his voice, on the pressure of his thumb against the back of her neck. She felt like collapsing.

Suddenly, he loosened his embrace. "Belle, wait. There's not time for this. What did you do with the body?"

Her mind was numb; the words barely registered.

"What?" she mumbled.

"The body," Rumple urged, gripping her waist. "Belle, the body...is it still there? In the cell?"

She jolted upright.

The body. Of course he'd need to know about that.

"N-no. She's not there. They'll probably think she escaped somehow. It...it was weird. When she died, she shattered into these porcelain shards, and then, there was like this wind that swept into the cell and carried the grains of the porcelain away. There's nothing left."

Rumple frowned, but if he knew what that meant he didn't offer up such information. Instead, he took her by the wrist and led her to the back of the shop.

"Darling, sit down. I'll take care of this, and I'll be right back." He backed away from her.

"T-take care of it? W-what are you going to do?"

"Protect you. Like I said I would." He turned and made to go through the curtain that separated the backroom from the rest of the shop.

"But you don't need to protect me," Belle protested; she shook her head. "This is my fault. I'll confess to it. Just let me—"

"No!" he snapped, rounding on her. "I already lost my son. I will _not_ lose you too." Then, as if to apologize for speaking so harshly, he brushed her cheek with the back of his hand. "Please," he pleaded in a softer voice. "Stay here. Let me handle this, and we can be together. Forever."

"But Regina knows she gave me the dagger," she argued weakly.

"Regina would never suspect you."

Belle paused, then nodded slowly. That much was true.

It scared her how wrong about people one could be. How wrong about oneself.

"Then they'll suspect you," she said, panic rising in her throat again. "They'll turn against you again. They'll—"

"No. They won't," Rumple answered calmly. "Not if you have my dagger."

"What?" Belle frowned, not understanding.

"If you have my dagger, that means you can control me. Remember?"

"Oh...Oh, that's right." Her eyes drifted to the side of her coat that hid the weapon, but she didn't want to pull it out, even to get rid of it. She didn't want to touch it.

"I'm sure they'd trust you to curb my more...homicidal tendencies," Rumple went on.

Belle shut her eyes again. She felt sick.

"Come on." He took her by the hand and lowered her onto the small bed. "Sit down. I have to go now."

Belle numbly followed his request. She tried to stop her hands from trembling, the hands that might as well have been covered in blood. Once he disappeared through the curtain and she heard the front door clang shut, she searched the collection of knickknacks surrounding her for anything to distract herself from imagining the worst-case scenario when Zelena was found to be missing. It was useless, though. For now, she could only wait and relieve the twist in her gut with the knowledge that Rumplestiltskin would know what to do.

If anyone would know what to do in this type of situation, it would be him.

After a few minutes, she made herself take the dagger out of her coat and set it gingerly beside her on the bed.

She stared at it, still wanting to give herself up, but Rumple was right. What had she even vanquished Zelena for if not so they could be together? And if she confessed, what would be the point but to soothe her guilty conscience? It wasn't as if Zelena's death would be mourned.

Killing a defenseless woman in a jail cell...that wasn't what heroes did. What good people did.

And yet she...she couldn't bring herself to regret it entirely. She'd done it for Rumple; she'd done it because some part of her needed to do that for him. In that moment, she hadn't wanted to be a hero anymore; she had only wanted to protect her love, at all costs.

Belle waited and waited, and after an eternity of minutes, Rumple returned, proclaiming the deed done. He'd magically altered the video footage. Everyone thought Zelena had committed suicide.

At that, Belle started crying, though she couldn't say why she did at that exact moment—exhaustion maybe—and Rumple sat down beside her—putting the dagger away on a shelf—and pulled her close.

"I'm sorry I got mad at you for going after Regina," she apologized through her tears. "I didn't...understand what you'd gone through...thinking me dead all that time. I'm just a silly girl who thinks she knows everything about life because she read it in a book." She cried into his shoulder.

She wanted to say more.

She wanted to tell him that if they got through this, she was going to do better. She wanted to say she was sorry she couldn't be the girl he'd met all those years ago, that life had chipped away at her as surely as it had done that cup. That she no longer recognized herself.

She wanted to say that she'd missed him more than she thought possible, and if he left her again, she didn't know what she'd do.

But she couldn't say anything further because her tears spilled over again, and she couldn't hold back her sobs.

"There, there," she heard Rumple saying, the sound of his voice muffled by her own cries. "That doesn't matter. It's all right. Everything's going to be fine."

It wasn't all right, but she let him say it anyway. Let him rub her back and kiss the top of her head while she sobbed.

This wasn't right either. She should be comforting _him_. _He_ was the one who'd lost his son, who'd just been freed from his prison. And now she had put this burden on him.

But he held onto her until her tears subsided, and only then did she realize that he, too, was crying.

At first, she feared it was because of her, but then she heard his boy's nickname: Bae. He was shuddering and whispering the name over and over again, whispering how sorry he was.

Knowing he needed comfort wrenched her from her own well of regret.

"Bae loved you. He forgave you. You must know that," she soothed, stroking the back of his neck.

Rumple didn't answer, but he sighed into her embrace.

She didn't know how long they sat there, holding each other like they were anchoring one another in an ocean of heartache and turmoil; the town was still and empty when they exited the shop, her hand clutching the crook of his arm. It was the middle of a deep, moonless night, and everything was dark, so dark that if it weren't for the street lamps Belle would only have seen shadowy, foreboding silhouettes instead of buildings.

But the streetlights cast a soft glow on the sleepy town and lit up even their somber faces, and despite not knowing what tomorrow would bring, they were heading home.

She was holding onto her love, and he was guiding her over cracks in the pavement.

They were taking tentative steps, but they were moving forward, ever forward.

In the dark, but together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be honest, I wasn't sure if Zelena turned into porcelain because of Rumple doing some sort of dark magic or because of the dagger itself or because of her own magical defenses. But to make things easier on myself, I just left that part as it was.
> 
> I know this is angsty and then it becomes fluffy in a super heavy way, but I just had to get it out of my system. Thanks for reading! :)


End file.
